Many oral appliances include a deformable material for forming a mold of some or all of a user's teeth to customize the oral appliance for the user. The deformable material is often placed in a tray before being inserted into the user's mouth. It is often desirable to form a durable mold that properly fits the user's teeth to improve the performance and lengthen the life of the associated oral appliance. Molds that are not durable or do not properly fit the user's teeth may prevent the associated oral appliance from adequately serving the purposes for which they were constructed.
A known technique for forming a mold of a user's teeth includes inserting a tray with a heated deformable material into the user's mouth, pressing the user's teeth into the deformable material, and removing the tray from the user's mouth after the deformable material has cooled. Such techniques may not provide a proper fit, however, due to the tendency of many deformable materials to contract during cooling, thereby expanding the impressions made by the user's teeth. In addition, this technique must often be repeated numerous times before even a marginally adequate fit can be achieved.
Deformable materials used in connection with such techniques may also cool more quickly and display less thermoplasticity at certain temperatures than the clinical professional might desire, thereby limiting the time in which the clinical professional may manipulate the deformable material to form a mold of the user's teeth. Furthermore, molds fitted using such techniques may be less safe for the user due to the increased tendency of the user's teeth to move with respect to a mold that does not properly fit the user's teeth. Moreover, many molds may display insufficient dimensional stability during cooling, hardness, or biocompatibility to function properly in a variety of contexts. In addition, such materials may be difficult or impossible to introduce into the mouth of a user to properly customize an existing mold, limiting the efficiency, economic availability, and effectiveness of techniques associated with these materials.
Even if an adequate fit is achieved through the use of a suitable deformable material, the deformable material may delaminate from the tray in a relatively short period of time, making the oral appliance inoperative thereafter. In addition, if such delamination occurs during use of the oral appliance, the user is inconvenienced and may need to have the oral appliance mended or replaced. In other situations, the user may be injured or be left more prone to injury as a result of such delamination. These and other deficiencies make prior oral appliances inadequate for many applications.